We say:This argument is wrong. It is also dangerous.

It is wrong because it ignores the significant steps that Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas, Prime Minister Salam Fayyad, and others in the PA have taken to build the institutions necessary to govern under the current circumstances and to act as the infrastructure for a nascent state. These measures may not satisfy everyone, especially those inclined to believe that the PA is not serious. But they have been significant enough to prompt Israel and the United States to express satisfaction with the Palestinian Authority's financial reforms, structural reforms and security performance, particularly in northern West Bank towns such as Nablus and Jenin.

It is dangerous because most Israeli strategists agree today that a Palestinian state is an Israeli national security interest as much as it is a Palestinian interest. Israel wants to rid itself of the occupation and wants to live in peace with its Palestinian neighbors. If the moderate leadership of the Palestinians in the West Bank is struggling, Israel's interest is to support it and find ways to help empower it. Israel's own interests are promoted when it demonstrates to Palestinians that moderation and pragmatism pays, and that moderate leaders can deliver.

The best way to change hearts and minds of West Bank Palestinians is not through intensifying and perpetuating their sense of oppression and resentment but through showing them that pragmatism yields tangible results and real hope.